Region Student Branches: (Chapter)
UF - University of Florida - Gainesville (Jacksonville)
UCF - University of Central Florida - Orlando (Central Florida)
USF - University of South Florida - Tampa (Florida West Coast)
FIU - Florida International University - (Miami)
FAU - Florida Atlantic University, Florida Technical College Pembroke Pines - (Gold Coast)
FIT - Florida Institute of Technology - (Spacecoast)
FTC - Florida Technical College - Kissimmee - (Spacecoast)
PR - University of Turabo, Politechnic University, University of Puerto Rica-Mayaguez - (Puerto Rico)
PUCP - Peru - Pontificia Universidad Católica del Peru - Lima - (Florida West Coast)
UM - University of Miami, Lindsey Hopkins Tech Education Center, Miami Senior Adult Education Center - (Miami)
UNF - University of North Florida - (Jacksonville)
Universidade De Brasilia, UMC Universidade De Mogi das Cruzes, Curitiba Student Bracha, Goias Student Branch, Arch Tech Labaut Student Branch, Volcano Student Branch, Pantanal, UNC SP - (Brasil)
Florianopolis - (South Brasil)
Universidad Nacional de la Plata, Universidad Nacional Lujan + UTN, Libertador, Efficiency, Universidad Tecnológica Nacional, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Instituto Tecnológico Universitario, Ingeniería UNC, Tecnológico Argentino, Universidad Tecnológia Nacional- Architectural Faculty, FIUBA Student Branch, UTN Bahía Blanca, ET No. 14 Libertad, UNT, Santa Cruz - (Argentina)
Universidad Nacional , Universidad de los Andes, Universidad El Bosque, Universidad Santo Tomas, Universidad del Atlantico, Universidad del Valle, Pascual Bravo, Universidad de Antioquia, Universidad UPB, Universidad EIA, Universidad EAFIT - (Colomibia)
Escuela Politecnica Nacional, SB, UPS - Cuenca Student Branch, Guayaquil Student Branch - (Ecuador)
ING Universidad de Chile Student Branch - (Chile)
Electromecánica Bolivia Student Branch - (Bolivia)
UNA - (Paraguay)
Trinidad - (Caricom)
Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral (Central & South America)
The Design Competition 2017 selected University of Central Florida as 2nd Place in Integrated Sustainable Building Design. Let´s congratulate them.
The Design Competition 2016 selected University of Central Florida as 1st Place in Integrated Sustainable Building Design. Let´s congratulate them.
The Design Competition 2015 selected University of Central Florida as 2nd Place in Design Calculations. Let´s congratulate them.
The Design Competition 2014 selected University of Central Florida as 1st Place in Design Calculations. Let´s congratulate them.
The Design Competition 2013 selected University of Florida as Rising Star in HVAC Design Calculations. Let´s congratulate them.
ASHRAE sponsors these competitions to encourage students to become involved in a profession that is crucial to ensuring a sustainable future for our Earth – the design of energy-efficient HVAC systems. ASHRAE will recognize the outstanding student design projects at the 2022 ASHRAE Winter Meeting scheduled for January in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States of America.
The student design competition guidelines provide enough background information to enable the teams to design or select the HVAC system for the given building, or to design a sustainable building implementing an integrated building design process (the architectural and building design for sustainability, and its supporting mechanical and electrical systems) for the given program.
The Integrated Sustainable Building Design (ISBD) competition's aim is to encourage students to extend their knowledge beyond the core mechanical systems. For the ISBD category, the final design level presented may be in a preliminary stage, as the competition's basic intention is to challenge students' imaginative thinking and creative engineering approach to the building and all of its systems.
Teams may compete in one of the three categories:
ASHRAE recommends that the project groups consist of at least two members from an undergraduate engineering or architecture curriculum for the HVAC Design Calculations or HVAC System Selection and at least three members (architecture or construction, mechanical and electrical) for the ISBD competition. Team members can be from multiple colleges. All team members must be enrolled during the semester/term in which they contribute to the design.
Participating teams are NOT required to have an ASHRAE Student Branch at their university.
The 2020 student competition focuses on a building on a higher education campus in Sidney, New South Wales, Canada. The final HVAC System Selection and Design for the proposed building shall address the following major design goals:
Owners Requirements
Services Overview Utility and Service Life Overview
Weather data
Competition Drawings
DWG Files
1. HVAC Design Calculations
For students who have attended 1-2 HVAC courses. Focuses on the design calculations required to provide an energy-efficient design for the facility. Students are required to determine heating and cooling loads, and design the selected HVAC systems for the building, while demonstrating compliance with ASHRAE Standards 55, 62.1, and 90.1.
AND/OR
2. HVAC Systems Selection
For students at schools completing a dedicated HVAC or building environmental systems curriculum. The project encourages students with a solid HVAC base to use life-cycle cost process to select the building HVAC system(s) as well as incorporate the sustainability process promoted by ASHRAE by integrating ASHRAE Standard 189.1-2011 - Standard for the Design of High-Performance Green Buildings, and the US Green Building Council's LEED™ Rating System (or equivalent in the home country of international students.)
3. Integrated Sustainable Building Design (ISBD)
This 2017-2018 student competition requires multidisciplinary teams to design an energy efficient sustainable project approaching a "Zero Energy" building with minimized energy demands for HVAC and all other technical systems that could be satisfied with locally available or building-installed renewable energy sources (RES). Students will be asked to satisfy a national or local sustainability standard (LEED or the equivalent in their country), and then implement RES to approach "Zero Energy" limit.
The fundamental goal of this design competition category is to encourage students to obtain experience in the ISBD process. Architects and engineers should work together from the very beginning to determine building orientation, layout, materials, mechanical systems, and electrical systems that meet the client's needs and work with the surrounding environment to minimize energy consumption.
4. Applied Engineering Challenge (AEC)
Design a system to be used by building occupants to report operational issues to building operators. The system should identify issues and provide solutions and/or next steps to solve these problems.
As an example, your system may be an automated platform that integrates to open, standard building automation systems. The system could also be standalone and offer building occupants a way to provide objective, constructive feedback to building operators while assisting building operators in assessing and solving operational issues. Whatever direction you choose, judging will be weighed heavily on real-world functionality of your design across a broad spectrum of buildings and building occupants and operators.
The system shall take into account multiple system variables, including space temperatures, humidity, lighting, acoustics, building plant design criteria, and outdoor conditions to determine the best course of action to address the occupant complaint.
Designs should accommodate a large commercial building (100,000 ft2 [9290 m2] or greater), with the ability to scale up to multiple buildings on a campus or in a business park. Assume the building being monitored has heating and cooling systems as well as ventilation and airflow to meet all ASHRAE standards. Designs shall consider all types of HVAC systems (constant volume, VAV, heat pumps etc.) and be generic enough to use across multiple building design scenarios.
ALL SUBMISSIONS ARE TO BE SUBMITTED ELECTRONICALLY via the ASHRAE FTP site. Only those teams that register will get the FTP site information and instructions for uploading entries.
All teams that are registered participants of the Design Competition will receive the FTP upload instructions via email. If your team is not registered, you will NOT receive this information.
The submission for the HVAC Design Calculations competition must be in PDF format only! No separate visual aids will be accepted (PowerPoint, YouTube, etc). Deliverable presentation should consist of a 35-page maximum technical report in PDF format only. Font size should be 11 pts, utilizing either Arial or Times New Roman.
The submission for HVAC System Selection competition is limited to 15 minutes visual aid (PowerPoint, YouTube, etc.) All PPTs have to be automated and not page by page click ALONG with a 30-page maximum technical report in PDF format. Font size should be 11 pts, utilizing either Arial or Times New Roman.
The submission for the Integrated Sustainable Building Design competition is limited to 15 minutes (PowerPoint, YouTube, etc.) ALONG with a 35-page maximum technical report in PDF format. Font size should be 11 pts, utilizing either Arial or Times New Roman.
The submission for the Applied Engineering Challenge must be submitted electronically by June 8, 2020 by uploading the entry to the ASHRAE Society FTP site established for this purpose. Only teams who register will receive the FTP site information, so please register at least 30 days prior to this date to allow for processing. The submission must be limited to a 25-page maximum technical report. The document must be formatted to 8.5 x 11 inch paper with margins of 1 inch, a font size of 11 points using either Arial or Times New Roman, and a line spacing not less than the Microsoft Word standard of 1.15. All documents must be delivered in PDF format and should be clearly readable in black and white print.
Have a question?
Please submit your questions here
Please allow up to 5 business days for a response.
What is the Evaluation Time Schedule?
There will be three levels of evaluation. Evaluators at all levels will judge the design project reports, not only for content, but also for compliance with the contest rules.
May 4, 2022
Entries must be submitted electronically by this date by uploading the entry to the ASHRAE Society FTP site established for this purpose. Only teams who register will get the FTP site information emailed to them, so please register at least 30 days prior to this date to allow for processing.
Only ASHRAE chapters with registered teams will have the FTP site emailed to them as well.
Teams that do not have a local chapter are required to adhere to this same deadline. Your entry will be evaluated by the closest chapter to your school or your Regional Vice-Chair (RVC) for Student Activities.
May 18, 2022
Deadline for local ASHRAE Chapters to forward their selection of the best entry in each category to the Student Activities Regional Vice Chair (RVC). Chapters are to download the necessary entries from the ASHRAE FTP site for local judging. FTP site information is only distributed to those chapters that have teams registered to participate in the competition.
Once your selection is made simply email the names of the winning entries to your RVC with a copy to kthomson@ashrae.org by the deadline above.
If applicable, chapters should ALSO nominate a "rising star" as well. The Rising Star must be a school that does not qualify for the regional or national competition, but is a quality entry and the school has not had a winning entry in the previous three years.
June 8, 2022
Deadline for local ASHRAE Student Activities Regional Vice Chairs to forward their selection of the best entry in each category to ASHRAE Headquarters for national judging. Regional Vice Chairs are to download the necessary entries in your region from the ASHRAE FTP site for judging.
Once your selection is made simply email the names of the entries to kthomson@ashrae.org by the deadline above.
All entries that pass regional judging will be submitted to the national judging committee for final judging.
If applicable, Regional Vice Chairs can nominate a "rising star" as well. The Rising Star must be a school that does not qualify for the national competition, but is a quality entry and the school has not had a winning entry in the previous three years.
June 24, 2022
National level competition under the direction of the Student Activities Design Competition Subcommittee will complete evaluation of national level entries, and will select 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners in each category. In order to encourage additional schools to participate in the competition, a "Rising Star" winner will be chosen within each category from among those schools that have not had a winning entry in the previous three years.
Please Note: The Society level of the competition is conducted during a closed subcommittee session and therefore, team members and/or faculty advisors, or other persons outside of the Student Activities Committee, may not attend. Any violation of this notice can result in a team's disqualification from the competition.
August 1, 2022
Winners announced
Awards will be presented to the winners of each of the three competitions as follows:
First Place: $2,000 plus a representative from the team will receive free transportation, two nights lodging and $100 expenses for attendance at the 2023 ASHRAE Winter Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America where the award will be presented at the ASHRAE Plenary. A 24 x 36 inch poster is required for display at the ASHRAE Student Program.
Second Place: A representative from the team will receive free transportation, two nights' lodging at the 2023 ASHRAE Winter Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America where the award will be presented at the ASHRAE Student Program. A 24 x 36 inch poster is required for display at the ASHRAE Student Program.
Third Place: A representative from the team will receive free transportation, two nights lodging at the 2023 ASHRAE Winter Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America where the award will be presented at the ASHRAE Student Program. A 24 x 36 inch poster is required for display at the ASHRAE Student Program.
Rising Star: A representative from the team will receive free transportation and two nights lodging for attendance at the 2023 ASHRAE Winter Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America where the award will be presented at the ASHRAE Student Program. A 24 x 36 inch poster is required for display at the ASHRAE Student Program.
K - 12 Resource Center
ASHRAE has a new and improved activity and resource site for K-12. Do your part in educating the future engineers. With more activities, a discussion board, videos and reference materials, this is your one stop shop for educational tools. Learn more -->
These are the new scholarships, which will be available for 2021-2022:
The following are the ASHRAE’s scholarship assistance for 2021-2022:
The following awards provide one-year $3,000 scholarships:
For more information on ASHRAE scholarships, visit www.ashrae.org/scholarships. Applications are now being accepted for the 2020-2021 undergraduate, regional/chapter and university-specific scholarships. The deadline is December 1.
ASHRAE is unique because its membership is drawn from a wide range of disciplines relating to the HVAC&R field. Approximately 57,000 individuals from more than 100 nations belong to the Society. Among them are students, consulting engineers, mechanical contractors, building owners, and employees of manufacturing companies, educational institutions, research organizations, government or any organization concerned with environmental control. Members range from students to longtime engineers and professionals in other related disciplines such as architecture and medical research
To Join visit www.ashrae/students
We have a lot of resources for our students. Please visit www.ashrae.org/student-resources
Newsletter: Please visit Newsletter
Facebook: Only for Students click here
Washington Internships for Students of Engineering (WISE) program
Ashrae offers grants for Senior Undergraduate projects and Graduate Students. Click on the link you want to explore.
Ashrae design the SmartStart Program. Learn more -->